


sour candy

by Kamiizumi



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: "my boyfriend is a ??????", Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, M/M, Supernatural Elements, but with a twist, mild elements of gore and blood, minsung - Freeform, minsung season | colourful autumn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:28:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27172441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kamiizumi/pseuds/Kamiizumi
Summary: “...You got a little...um...something something on your chin there.”Minho blinks once and stares at him, almost like he had been expecting an entirely different response. Then – almost deliberately – he smirks that stunning smirk of his, raising a bloodied hand up to his face and swiping at his bottom lip, not at all clearing away any of the blood but instead streaking more of it on his handsome face.Disregarding the metaphorical alarm bells going off in his head, Jisung mentally notes how attractive he would be right now if he wasn’t currently soaked in blood.
Relationships: Han Jisung | Han/Lee Minho | Lee Know
Comments: 8
Kudos: 127
Collections: MINSUNG SEASON: Colourful Autumn 2020





	sour candy

**Author's Note:**

> hello and welcome to day 1 of minsung season [r e d]! first of all, HAPPY BIRTHDAY MINHO <3 I hope you have a great birthday with the biggest mukbang ever and lots of fun time with your cats and your members uwu
> 
> for day 1 [r e d], my inspiration was...blood and the idea of sinister things, like a certain type of horned, red monster with spiked tails, but also an idea of a passionate, whirlwind romance owo anywho pls enjoy, and don't forget to check out more submissions at https://twitter.com/minsungseason !

_He will be the death of me_ , Jisung thinks.

Their personalities melded like butter and popcorn, chocolate and vanilla, honey and tea. But at a glance, he and his mysterious new paramour could not...be any more different.

Jisung remembers it like it was _yesterday_ – him working the rush hour at the university café because he’s a college sophomore who needed a way to pay off the rather exorbitant rent at his shared downtown apartment. Being a music major was fine and dandy, but it was a long way until graduation, and most importantly, a long way before he was going to be making a stable income.

So here he was, unruly hair pulled back with a cheap plastic headband and admittedly smelling too much like hazelnut syrup and dark roast, when quite possibly the most handsome creature Jisung had laid his mortal eyes on walks straight up to the register in a cleanly pressed but still casual suit.

“Hi, what can I – “ Jisung’s eyes lock onto his and it almost feels like he truly is the rabbit hiding in the brush that’s just been spotted by the starving tiger prowling about. “Get...for…”

Was it the slick of his hair – luscious brown waves that were effortlessly pushed back from his forehead? Was it the cut of his jaw, sharp enough that if the man clenched his jaw, Jisung might slice open his retinas just staring at him? Maybe there was something about his eyes – _God, those eyes_ , Jisung thinks as the natural buzz of the room melts into television static, clouding his ears.

“ _Ahem._ ”

Jisung returns to the present, his gaze once again focused on the customer in front of him, now glowering. He blinks a few times before dragging the most _timid_ of voices up and out of his throat.

“S-Sorry.” Jisung chuckles out of nervousness and offers to placate the handsome customer’s maximum strength RBF with a toothy smile; it doesn’t really work. “What can I get for you?”

When the customer opens his mouth to speak again, the background noise rises in volume and muffles his ears like static, and everything begins to blur into a _Gogh_ -esque swatch of colors and swirls. _Iced americano_ , Jisung makes out on the young man’s lips, and he nods like he understands but really it’s just the art of having mastered lipreading in a room as noisy and bustling as this one.

“One iced americano. W-Will that be all?” Why does his lip quiver? _Why did it quiver_ , he panics at the last second as he is once again sucked into the present.

“That’ll be all.” His voice is sweet like honey and bitter like coffee at the same time. Jisung somehow feels lightheaded.

“Y-Your total is, um, $2.95,” he stutters. The young man’s unflinching gaze keeps him petrified like a cobra’s stare, even when he slips his card out to tap it on the card reader in front. Before the customer returns his card back to its snug spot in his wallet ( _Designer_ , Jisung notes, judging from the shiny black leather), the corners of his lips visibly turn up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it smirk.

“Don’t need a receipt. Thanks.”

Jisung swallows thickly. “We’ll, uh, call your name when it’s ready.” The customer gives him one last passing glance before leaving the counter, and it’s only then that Jisung realizes he’s been holding in a breath – and that his chest was pounding like he’d just been running from an animal. In truth, Jisung feels a bit ridiculous; like he was some protagonistic bimbo in a self-indulgent piece of literature that had just met their fated romantic interest.

However, upon reading the name billed to the card on the system, something like a chill runs up the individual ridges of his spine. These feelings of his, it wasn’t sudden infatuation, no, not at _all_ – it was a feeling of _dread_. Like something to be concerned over, something to be feared, like a gazelle with a gaping, bloodied wood hiding in the brush from a starving lion.

Jisung takes his break immediately after, and spends the entire fifteen minutes trying to calm himself down inside the café’s breakroom, his fingers trembling around a plastic cup filled with ice water. Nearly seven minutes in...the tremors stop. The overwhelming sense of dread just _dissipates_ , like someone or something just cut the string on his hung up body. All the tension in his body disappears, and Jisung sits there for a minute or two wondering if he had just hallucinated the entire experience, or if he had suddenly come down with the flu.

When he walked out of the breakroom to resume his shift, he half expected the handsome stranger to be staring at him across the room. To Jisung’s surprise, the stranger was nowhere to be found, and a quick relay with his coworkers confirmed that the customer’s iced americano had already been picked up, and he had since left the building.

A tightness returned to his chest when the mysterious customer arrived at the counter the following week, once more ordering a large iced americano with the thinnest of smiles adorning his impeccable face. This time, he added a croissant to his order, and Jisung punched in his order with the grace of a rat cornered by a starving stray cat.

“Y-Your total is $5.37. Cash or c-card?” Again with the stuttering; Jisung is close to smashing his head on the cash register, but he’s certain his manager wouldn’t like that.

The slightest hint of a smile plays on the customer’s lips as he slips a few folded bills across the counter towards Jisung. “Keep the change,” he says lowly, before pocketing his hands and regarding Jisung with his dark, marble-like eyes.

Jisung allows himself a sharp inhale through the nostrils as he unfurls the bills (a _one_ and a _five_ , specifically), but he manages a blink of mild curiosity when he notices the slightly crumpled piece of white paper folded in with the paper bills. He pauses, not long but long enough to consider way too many possibilities about what the mysterious gentleman just slipped him. He pockets the paper immediately and resumes punching in the order and slipping the cash into the register.

“...W-We’ll call you when your order’s ready.” Jisung timidly meets the young man’s eyes again, and the man simply nods and walks away, his lips still quirked in that coy way that he unnerved him for plenty of reasons.

He nearly shits himself a few seconds later when he ducks into the breakroom to read the crumpled piece of paper in his pocket, seeing the very same name from the card that the mysterious customer used last week.

_Lee Minho_

_text me?_

_02-XXX-XXXX_

* * *

Under any other circumstance, Jisung would have jumped at the opportunity to go out with any decent-looking guy who passed him their number at the counter. After all, he was young with plenty of free time – when he wasn’t breaking his teeth flashing his megawatt smile to over five hundred customers, three times a week, or procrastinating on his homework and waiting until the last minute to study for exams. And yet...he had good reason to hesitate on calling up the unsettlingly handsome stranger from the café.

“Is he creepy? Like in a _I sleep in my parents’ basement with the dogs and pour milk in my bowl before cereal_ creepy? Or are you just peeved about going out with someone more attractive for you for once?”

Jisung opens his mouth to respond, but quickly shifts to a look of annoyance as he swipes a hand at his best friend. Hyunjin squeaks and giggles before swerving out of the way, careful not to knock over the giant bag of chips in his lap.

“N-No, he’s – _okay._ He’s probably one of the most beautiful people I’ve ever seen in my life, and I say that lightly because I like to think _I’m_ a looker.” Jisung huffs and crosses his arms. “It’s just...both times I’ve seen him at the café I just get this _really_ heavy feeling in my chest, it’s almost uncomfortable.”

“So you’re saying he’s _that_ hot – “

“Can you _shut up_?”

Hyunjin giggles like a middle schooler again and scoots closer to grab at the slip of paper sitting on Jisung’s lap. “...Honestly, no harm in contacting the guy and seeing what he’s all about. If anything, he has good taste if he’s brave enough to give you his number the second time he’s seen you at the counter. And if he’s a murderer, then more fish for the rest of us to fry, isn’t that right?”

“I hate you sometimes, Hyunjin.”

Hyunjin sticks out his tongue playfully as he hands the piece of paper back to Jisung, and moments later Jisung is shuffling around in his pocket for his phone.

The text message Jisung leaves is part cordial, part casual, and part unassuming; something inside him is urging him to hesitate on a date, but that something is also telling him that this might be the dose of exciting he needed in his otherwise monotonous college sophomore life. Hyunjin is a bit miffed that the mysterious _Lee Minho_ doesn’t respond near instantaneously like he’d hoped, and for a split second Jisung considers the worst possible outcomes in his head.

It isn’t until dinner time, and long after Hyunjin’s left his dorm that his phone pings with announcement, _long_ after Jisung’s forgotten he sent the text message in the first place.

8:41 PM

**Lee Minho** _sorry about the late response. just got home from work_

 **Lee Minho** _really glad you took me up on my offer though_

 **Lee Minho** _i was starting to think you weren’t interested ;)_

Cue Jisung’s spoon clattering to the floor and splattering ramen broth all over the floor.

* * *

He wasn’t certain if it was just the butterflies in his stomach or if he might have _actually_ agreed to go out with someone that could be a serial killer, but that certain feeling of dread didn’t escape him when he opened his front door to meet the young man. _Lee Minho_ , Jisung manages to eke out without sounding like he was about to piss himself, and yet a _different type of dread_ overcomes him upon seeing Minho’s immaculately soft-looking cashmere sweater framing that similarly immaculate face of his – Jisung thought a ratty old hoodie, ripped jeans, and one of his well-loved chucks would suffice for a first date. Despite his initial skepticisms and fear of the _stunning_ young man, part of him was glad they decided to go out for lunch in such a public place – corndogs and boba at a plaza just ten minutes away by car, because Jisung mentioned he’d prefer not to be anywhere near coffee or bread. The other part of him was even gladder because...it turned out he and Minho were more compatible than he could have imagined.

Any concerns Jisung might have had gradually dissipated over the course of the date, when he was halfway through one of his corndogs and almost burst out laughing because of a stupid joke that Minho just said. Behind that icy exterior and a visage that made Jisung feel unworthy to be _looked at_ was a mild-mannered young man just like him. Minho was _far_ less intimidating when he smiled, and there was plenty of that on their date, much to Jisung’s satisfaction. (He might have spent an inordinate amount of that time staring at him like he was marble come to life.)

The date lasted a mighty bit longer than just _corndogs and boba_ , and Jisung surprised himself by suggesting they stay out a bit longer; he didn’t have anything else to do that day anyway.

In between bouts of ice cream, playing around at a park downtown, and even more boba, Jisung gleaned some choice information from the other man that humanized him beyond his perception of just being the “mysterious coffee shop customer that could cause heart attacks and traffic jams”. He learned Minho was a recent graduate who’d just moved for a job with one of the tech giants in the city and had yet to be familiar with the area. He also lives in an apartment on the upper side of town with his three cats, Soonie, Doongie, and Dori. (Minho showed him pictures on his phone over sips of milk tea and occupying the swings at the playground downtown. Dori is his favorite.)

Jisung fails to notice the sun setting over the city skyline, and only realizes he’s been out pretty much the entire day when the streetlamps begin illuminating throughout the park. The both of them share an awkward laugh, and Jisung’s heart nearly rips itself out of his chest when Minho easily slots Jisung’s hand in his and leads him back to his car.

The unease that caged him ever since the day Minho ordered that iced americano at the café melts away like honey, when Minho drives him back to his dorm, hands still locked and their attentions still untorn from each other as Jisung regales him with another silly story about his sophomore escapades.

Jisung’s first dates never go this smoothly, and when they sit in silence in the parking lot right outside his building, his eyes are first drawn to their hands still linked over the center partition, then up to Minho’s face, his face softly illuminated by the streetlights outside. _I could get used to this_ , Jisung thinks to himself, sinking deeper and deeper into Minho’s cobra-like stare.

Without warning, Jisung launches himself across the partition and pulls the other boy in for a searing kiss, like he was running out of air and he were a tank filled to the brim with oxygen. Now, Jisung rarely ever sleeps with someone on the first date, if _ever_ , but all it takes is for him to whisper _my roommates are home right now_ and suddenly the car is revving back to life. Something nasty and intense thunders in Jisung’s chest as Minho steers the car back downtown to the older boy’s apartment.

The rest is a blur, but a beautiful, impassioned blur, especially when Jisung wakes up the next morning in a clean, unfamiliar bed with plenty of telltale bruises all over his body and the smell of bacon and eggs hanging in the air. Jisung quickly likens Minho to be like one of those infuriatingly tart _Warheads_ candies, finely dusted with powders so sour that it was guaranteed to make your jaw ache...and yet, the candy underneath is succulent and sweet.

That was _then_.

All Jisung wanted to do was be the nice – what did they even call themselves? Boyfriends? _Mutually exclusive_ ? Whatever it was, it had been going on for over a month and a half with no signs of stopping, and Jisung figured it would be a nice gesture to surprise the workaholic with a cake to celebrate their 50th day of... _whatever_ it was they had. Jisung and the devilishly handsome, somewhat strange, but all too endearing Lee Minho.

He didn’t own a car, so he had to leave the dorms quite a bit early to be able to bus his way deeper downtown and pick up the cake he ordered before arriving at Minho’s apartment. He already knew Minho kept a spare key around ( _Smart people keep spare keys under their doormats_ , Jisung recites to himself), and it didn’t take long for him to let himself into the apartment. He’s immediately greeted by Minho’s litter of cats who all take turns snuggling up to his shins and rubbing themselves all over him. Judging by the pair of dress shoes neatly placed in the doorway, it seems the owner of the apartment has beaten him here.

A sigh slips from his lips; no surprises here because Minho’s surely heard him open the front door. Instead, he steels himself and eagerly bounds for his bedroom, already calling out for his not-quite-a-boyfriend-yet’s name. As he pads along the hardwood floor in his socks, an odd stench pervades his nostrils; did he forget to throw something out or whatever? His cats follow behind him, trying to jump onto the back of his legs and meowing incessantly, as if to catch his attention.

Jisung immediately wishes he had followed his instincts.

Nothing could have prepared him for the sight that is Lee Minho himself, kneeling in a puddle of blood in his own bathroom, holding a mangled carcass of _something_ in his arms. The crimson runs down the segment tiles in rivulets, and he only notices now that he’s stepped in something wet when he looks down and sees the red seeping into the whiteness of his socks. And the _stench_ , oh _God_ , the _stench_.

Jisung’s every fiber is frozen in place, but his brain is telling him - no, _screaming_ at him to make a run for it, and yet -- 

His gaze locks onto Minho, now staring right back at him with beady, brown – almost pitch black – eyes. There is blood smeared all over his lips, down his chin, and completely soaking through the white of his dress shirt. Minho simply smiles, teeth stained pink. Jisung looks up, and then everything goes black.

* * *

Jisung comes to with a groan, vision blurry and dizzy as he looks up at what seems to be a ceiling. A soft mewl and a warm, but not overbearing, pressure on his chest causes him to shift. A bundle of splotched gray and white fur comes into his vision which he immediately realizes as Minho’s cat Dori. He reaches up to stroke its fur for a few seconds before the realization sets in.

“You know you’ve only been out for twenty minutes.”

A yelp slips out from Jisung’s throat as he flinches in his seat, causing Dori to jump from his lap and run away deeper into the apartment. He’s sitting on Minho’s sofa, in his living room, and his eyes dilate as his brain slowly pieces everything back together.

Minho sits right across from him on another expensive looking recliner, still covered in vividly red blood all the way from his maw down his torso. The black color of his slacks don’t show any of the red, but the damp sheen of blood on his kneecaps betray him. The blood has already stained the lush fur carpet under the coffee table between them, as well as the leather of his recliner, but Jisung is too afraid and mind-boggled to even point that out.

The blood rushes and pumps in his ears while the thundering of his chest grows stronger by the second, and yet Jisung finds power in himself to _speak_.

“...You got a little...um...something _something_ on your chin there.”

Minho blinks once and stares at him, almost like he had been expecting an entirely different response. Then – almost deliberately – he smirks that stunning smirk of his, raising a bloodied hand up to his face and swiping at his bottom lip, not at all clearing away any of the blood but instead streaking more of it on his handsome face.

Disregarding the metaphorical alarm bells going off in his head, Jisung mentally notes how attractive he would be right now if he wasn’t currently soaked in blood. Jisung almost recoils in horror when Minho ignores just how bloody his clothes are and crosses his arms over his chest, then leans back against the recliner oh so casually.

“You all good? You passed out so easily when you saw me in the bathroom – “

Something in Jisung erupts. The thunderstorm in his chest only rages on.

“Uh, _yeah_?” His eyes could pop out of his skull with how hard he’s staring at Minho. “I...I don’t know what I saw in your bathroom, but maybe you’d like to shine a light on that mystery, hm?”

Minho rolls his eyes and snickers, now loosening his posture and leisurely reclining in his seat like a mobster fresh off a kill. “For starters, I was eating a _goat_.”

“...A goat.” Jisung repeats the word like it’s supposed to enlighten him, but nothing – no lightbulbs here.

“Jisung...what do you think I am?” Minho tilts his head to one side, and a few of his hairs shift out of position. That smile of his continues to taunt him, and it isn’t until Jisung tries to respond that he realizes his lips have been _quivering_.

He inhales sharply. “...Are you going to kill me?”

“I _could_. I don’t see why I would, if I like you so much.”

A different heat overtakes his cheeks. “Well...are you like...a vampire?”

Minho purses his lips and shrugs. “Close.”

“You’re...an alien.”

“Cold.”

The smirk on Minho’s face feels like it gets wider and wider by the second, and honestly Jisung feels like he should have made a run for it a long time ago, but his guts tell him he won’t even make it past the coffee table.

“So...what _are_ you?”

Jisung stiffens in his seat when Minho rises from the recliner, and he realizes he must look like a deer in headlights as the mysterious stranger crosses the distance between them. He moves to sink himself further into the sofa when Minho finally stops in front of him, and a squeak slips past his lips when the bloodied man traps him with his hands pressed into the cushions on either side of him.

Jisung remains stock-still when Minho leans in close, his breath hot on his ear.

“...I’ll say this only one, so you listen carefully, okay, _Sungie_?” Hearing Minho’s nickname for him raises bumps on his skin.

“I’m a –”

Everything sounds like static, like he was suddenly watching television on an old-timey receiver with an antenna and the signal’s just gone _kaput_. It was cotton in his ears, fuzz and white noise, and nothing intelligible and yet – Jisung understands exactly what he’s hearing.

Minho’s stunningly ethereal features, the intense, almost out-of-body feeling of dread Jisung felt when they first met, and – _God_ , those _eyes_ , eyes that make him feel like he could hide no secrets.

Jisung regains his composure and snaps his head to look at Minho, their faces mere inches from each other. The older boy watches him the way a hawk eyes the mouse sniffing around in the undergrowth.

“...Am I scaring you, Jisung? Does knowing this information make you uncomfortable?”

He wants to respond, but he finds himself paralyzed under his cobra-like gaze.

“If we end things here...I’ll vanish from your life, no questions asked. You’ll remember none of this even happened.” Minho’s appeal is punctuated by the cats jumping up onto the sofa, ignoring their owner’s current state of goriness and attracting Jisung’s attention with a crescendo of _meows_. Jisung’s eyes flutter shut as a shuddering breath erupts from him; he must have been holding his breath again.

He surprises himself when he instead leans up to place a timid kiss on Minho’s right cheekbone, one of the few places on his person that _isn’t_ covered in goat blood.

“...I-I could do without the animal slaughter,” he begins, forcing himself not to gag on the stench of rotten animal coming off of Minho. “But...I like you a lot, more than I imagined. Just...go get cleaned up and we’ll talk about it over cake.”

Minho’s lips melt into a thin smile before he leans over and presses a kiss onto Jisung’s forehead, prompting the former to whine and protest.

“Happy fifty days, Sungie.”

The pounding in his chest magnifies, and when he watches Minho casually stride back to his bathroom, leaving red footprints all over the hardwood floor, Jisung can’t help but think he might have gotten himself tanged with something far beyond his mortal comprehension. _This love will kill me_ , Jisung thinks to himself, but when he scans his eyes around Minho’s lavish apartment and thinks about how good he’s had it since they started dating...well.

  
_I’ll be damned if this love isn’t worth dying for._

**Author's Note:**

> LMAO i feel a little gross starting off the event with such a...bloody and messy concept, but i guess it's kind of appropriate for spoopy season! thanks for making it this far and pls continue to check out the submissions with minsung season!


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